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The vacant lot in the north of Amsterdam where a fully 3D-printed canal house should be standing within three years.
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One of the first test building blocks already printed by the sized KamerMaker (Dutch for room builder), in front of the container-sized printer itself. The KamerMaker essentially works like a desktop version of the 3D Ultimaker printer, DUS architects said.
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The inside of the KamerMaker printer. Right now it takes about a week to print one three meter high corner stone of the canal house, said Hans Vermeulen, one of the other co-founders of DUS architects. Eventually they would like to be able to reduce that printing time should to about two hours.
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One of the cornerstones of the canal house being printed by the KamerMaker. While just a few centimeters high, some errors in the honeycomb structure are already showing in the front. Those errors will be corrected when the piece gets higher though, and they won't really affect the strength of the structure, said DUS architects co-founder Vermeulen.
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The KamerMaker disperses a bioplastic called Macromelt at 175 degrees celsius. The material stabalizes within two seconds. DUS architects hopes to speed up that process.
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The KamerMaker does not always print in a straight line. However, the errors will be compensated during the process, DUS architects said. If a piece comes out totally unusable it can be shredded and recycled to make a new one with just a small addition of fresh raw material, they said.
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The raw material called Macromelt is developed by Düsseldorf, Germany based company Henkel that manufactures adhesives for the electronics industry. The pellets are fed into the extruder of the KamerMaker in the control room. Just a few black pellets are enough to create a deep black color.
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One of the finished test pieces on display of the 3D canal house site in the north of Amsterdam.
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The honeycomb structure of one of the building blocks. The blocks will be filled with a foam that resembles concrete to strengthen the structure, Vermeulen said. The building will still be relatively light though and will be fastened to the ground with a "herring-like structure" so it won't get blown away during a storm.
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Scale models of the 13 rooms that are going to make up the canal house. Each room will have a different purpose. The models are 1:100 scale test samples for the real house.
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A scale model of the 3D-printed canal house.
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An impression of how the 3D-printed canal house could look when finished.
Slideshow: Amsterdam architects start printing a 3D canal house
12 Photos
The house should be finished within three years
